I told you in a previous post that I have forgiven my uncles; you know, the ones I was angry with for many years; the ones who envied my dad, so much that my dad could not contain his grief and so took his own life. I have forgiven them. For everything, including the fact that they could not love me. And I meant it when I said I forgave them. I still forgive them. I forgive them with every fiber of my being. And it is a true forgiveness, a divine forgiveness. It is a forgiveness that will last forever. Amen. I have "let go of the hope that the past could be any different." But I don't think they have let go of their hope to see me destroyed. Even though I have let them go free, they still hang on to their hope that I end up defeated, frustrated and unsuccessful. Without my desiring it, I still see them in my dreams, and I still sense the spiritual attacks they repeatedly send my way. Clearly then, even though I have left them and everything concerning them, they still refuse to free me from their wicked thoughts. What does a person do in such a case?
What I mean is this: What is the remedy for a situation where, even though you have forgiven and spiritually let go of your enemies, those enemies have not spiritually let go of you? You wake up in the morning and do not wish the slightest ill to these people, but they wake up in the morning and wish you every ill they can think of. What do you do then? You cannot retaliate by wishing them ill as well. If you do so, then you are back to where you started. You are back to the hating and the anger, and it means you haven't really moved on. You have undone the state of forgiveness it took you so long to attain. You cannot either let their spiritual attacks destroy you, or you would actually be where they want you to be: hell. So what do you do? You play on the defensive. You build an impregnable defense system in order to fend off their attacks.
But how? How do you build an impregnable wall about you in such a manner that the spiritual attacks your enemies persistently send do not destroy you? You have to have insight, to begin with. If you do not know you are being attacked, you cannot get into defense mode. So the starting point is to know that you are being attacked. Thankfully, I know I am being attacked. I know this as clearly as I know that I am typing this. I see in my dreams, in the signs around me and in my own philosophical reflections that I am definitely under spiritual attack from my extended biological family. I know this for a fact. And so I have insight into the situation. And I realize that they might never stop attacking me. In such a case, I must constantly live with this hazard: the persistence of spiritual attacks directed against me. It won't go away. It's like living with HIV. It very well may never blossom in to full-blown AIDS, especially if one handles the condition well; but it will always be there. And so, like HIV, I have to live with the constant reality of spiritual attacks. Insight.
What next? Now that I realize I need to have insight into the situation of living with persistent spiritual attacks sent me primarily by my extended biological family, and I do in fact have such insight, what else need I do? I should defend myself. Because I have refused to fight back by sending them attacks in return and so undo my forgiveness of them, I need to have a strong impenetrable defense against them in such a fashion that for however long they send attacks my way, they will never get me, until I have succeeded in doing all I was put on this planet to do, and have died at a ripe old age, hopefully in my sleep. What sort of defense should this be? It should be a spiritual defense. If the attacks are spiritual in nature, the defense would have to be spiritual in nature as well. But what spiritual defense system is so powerful as to permanently fend off the spiritual attacks I will have to live with, as sent to me by enemies that refuse to change?
It would have to be a sound epistemology. How? You see, happiness is ethics plus epistemology. Let me rephrase that in mathematical terms: Happiness = epistemology + ethics. This is a mathematical equation. Now, my enemies wish me to be unhappy. In other words, they wish me to have neither epistemology nor ethics. But, I already have epistemology. I already have insight into my condition. I already know that my enemies persistently send me evil attacks. So, I cannot not have epistemology. But how do I know that my epistemology is right? How do I know that the insight I have into the situation is accurate? How do I know that what I think I know is actually true? I have to test it. Now, whenever I act on what I claim to know and it makes me feel good, strong and in control, then I know by the equation above that it is true. Let's say I know A (epistemology), and I go ahead and act on the A I know (ethics), and it results in happiness and a sense of progress, then I know that A is true, because God wants us to be happy, and anything that makes us truly happy comes from God, and God is not a deceiver, and everything that comes from him is true.
I know that my enemies, especially my extended biological family keep sending me spiritual attacks (epistemology). I act cognizant of this knowledge (ethics) and it makes me feel more in control and better able to take charge of my destiny. God wants me to be more in control and better take charge of my destiny. And so, the knowledge that my enemies send me spiritual attacks is true. They actually do send me spiritual attacks, out of jealousy. And this is exactly, in any case, what happened with my dad. So, it's not even new. My dad was raised by the British all the way from childhood, through Baptist Boys' High School, Port Harcourt, all the way to University College, London. He was Assistant Comptroller of the entire Nigeria Customs, and this as far back as the 70s. He was an excellent worker, a definite type A achiever. But his brothers were jealous of him, and sought every way to undo him. And they did undo him in the end. They drove him, emotionally and spiritually, to take his own life. And having so succeeded, they similarly choose to undo his offspring in any way they possibly can. Which is what they do each day.
The good news, though, is that I am not my father. I can't overemphasize this point. I am not Patrick Nze. I am a totally different person. I'm courageous and determined. I know my truth (epistemology), and I act victoriously on it (ethics), and so I "stay calm and move on." Isaiah 54:17 says: "No weapon formed against me shall prosper; all those who rise up against me shall fall." I am determined to succeed. "I shall not die, but live to declare the goodness of God" (Psalm 118:17). Why were Patrick's brothers jealous of him? He had a wife; he had a good job and made money; he was special and smart and very talented, and so they could not stand him. In my case, I don't have a wife; I don't have money, and I am to be sworn to obedience, where I get to use my gifts only as I am led. I want to be a humble priest, and yet my enemies are not satisfied. Well, let them keep sending me spiritual attacks. We shall see what will happen in the end. When their enemies persisted in pursuing the Israelites, Yahweh told Moses not to worry because, "the enemy you see today, you will never see again" (Exodus 14:13). One day, when these enemies of mine are tired of sending attacks that ultimately fail, they will simply stop.
But I will not concentrate on them and their attacks. I will focus on God, who alone can defend me from them. With God helping me, I need never worry; I need never fear. I need instead to build a lasting, impregnable epistemology that is full of insight into the situation, and a determined defense against it. And I can do this only by the power of reason. Reason will defeat the emotions that hamper my acting on what I know. Reason will drive away negative emotions, such as: anger, despair, sadness, depression, and so forth. Reason will keep me alive. Reason will save me. When push comes to shove; when "the mountains tumble into the depths of the seas" (Psalm 46:2); when things go south; just give me reason. Give me the grace to think things through logically. I am not asking for faith; I am not the stuff of which saints are made. Just give me one and only one thing, O God; any day of the week, give me reason!
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